Artist Blog

Every week an artist whose single image was published by Der Greif is given a platform in which to blog about contemporary photography.

Gábor Kerekes passed away two years ago. He was a grand master of contemporary hungarian photography, an example for many. I got to know him personally through my then gallery Vintage, who used to represent both of us. Although Gábor was already a respected artist he would always turn up at the exhibition openings of even the youngest photographers. That was not his kindness, it was his honest commitment and interest towards the art of photography. Gábor Kerekes's ouvre covers a wide spectrum from documentary, experimental positions and even the use of archaic techniques. In his series Fly Off he appropriated and rephotographed aerial photographs to create a rather abstract and sinister set of small horizonless images, captured in an old technique I don't know much about, anthrakotype. As a rule I don't get excited at all about the hand crafted photograph, and I was tremendously relieved when technology offered a controllable environment for artists, like myself, desperately wanting out from dabbling around in darkrooms, but the insignificant-looking little pieces of Gábor spoke to me in an unresistable tone about the loneliness of man in the universe, the distance of ones soul from the crushing functionality of the industrial world. Visit the Gábor Kerekes Archive here, images are shown here with the kind permission of Dorsy Gallery.